This paper explores the complex and dynamic nature of infra-Islamic diplomacy in the early modern Mediterranean. Recent studies on early modern diplomacy by Christian Windler and Mathieu Grenet employ a socio-cultural framework to analyze Christian-Muslim relations. In doing so, their studies highlight the diplomat’s role in developing a ‘cross-culturalness’ that de-emphasizes religious markers and focuses on practice as opposed to perception. Though an important contribution to the field of early modern diplomacy, the Christian-Muslim framework fails to account for the complexities of diplomatic relations between Islamic governments. Thus, this paper intervenes in recent scholarship to demonstrate the relative importance of religious markers and varying cultural perceptions in infra-Islamic Mediterranean diplomacies. This paper examines two Moroccan ambassadors, Abū al-Qāsim al-Ziyyānī (d. 1833) and Ibn ʿUthmān al-Miknāsī (d. 1799), and their simultaneous journey to Istanbul in 1785 as a way to challenge the static category of ‘Islamic diplomacy’ that marks current studies. Working closely with their respective written accounts, I analyze why the two ambassadors transmitted such varying portrayals of the Ottoman Empire and the court in Istanbul. Though both traveled under the authority of Sidi Muḥammad Bin ʿAbdallāh (Moroccan Sultan, r. 1757-1789) each ambassador represented his mission and interaction with the court of Abdulhamid I (Ottoman Sultan r. 1774-1789) in an entirely different manner. A detailed analysis of the respective accounts reveals varying interpretations of Ottoman culture, diplomatic protocol, and manifestations of religious sovereignty. I argue that al-Ziyyānī’s and al-Miknāsī’s accounts employ varying degrees of Islamic rhetoric and cultural analogies to describe their missions to Istanbul. Through gradations of Islamic rhetoric and cultural equivalence, the accounts illustrate the mutability of such characteristics as ‘protocol,’ ceremony, and imperial sovereignty. Consequently, though ‘protocols’ and ‘ceremonies’ exist, they are supple and dependent on each diplomatic mission. For instance, recognition of non-Islamic, ‘foreign’ elements in Ottoman diplomatic protocol is either highlighted or ignored. I will further demonstrate how infra-Islamic solidarity is either amplified or diminished based on each ambassador’s conception of Islamic imperial geographies. In this way, an analysis of the ambassadors’ travelogues demonstrates the significance of religious markers and cultural perception in infra-Islamic diplomacy. Thus, by bringing into conversation diplomatic history, North African history, Ottoman history, and Islamic history we can begin to disentangle the static conception of early modern ‘Islamic diplomacy.’